Annus horribilis has gone. Emergency has bent us to remote teaching; after two terms (Spring and Fall 2020) it has eventually broken us. Nonetheless, researches and studies have gone onward. Vaccine arrived. Is Annus mirabilis coming? We shall see that at the next issue. Meanwhile, starting from two studies related to both sides of the coin Covid-19, such as health and economics, we present a selection of papers pandemic-time-conceived. 

COVER STUDIES

CoViSTAT19 ( ANALISI DATI E PREVISIONI SU COVID-19 - Analisi statistiche sulla diffusione del virus in Italia, by  Andrea Consiglio, Vito Muggeo, Gianluca Sottile, Vincenzo G. Genova, Giorgio Bertolazzi, Mariano Porcu e Giovanni Boscaino) provides both data-sets and tools for 

monitoring and foreseeing pandemic scenarios, at national and regional leves.  

Growth uncertainty, European Central Bank intervention and the Italian debt by Andrea Consiglio, Stavros Zenios state the European Central Bank intervention provides a buffer against the uncertainty faced by European Union economies in the face of COVID-19. For the time being, this intervention has alleviated concern about Italy's debt, but without it, Italy is vulnerable to a debt crisis.

LAW

From the Alps to the Pyramids, nothing new under the sun. (Namely, from the 'Turin Foodora-case's tantamount-employee' to the 'Palermo Glovo-case's employee'.) New and old answers to new and old issues by Calogero Massimo Cammalleri faces the impact of work through digital platforms and AI robotics implementation on Employment Law and Social Security issues. It pushes for introducing a new 'uniform' and indirect financial system for protections for those who are not in a standard employment relationship.

MANAGEMENT

The Marsala Wine Consortium. A business economic analysis of its history. Evolution, decline and possible future scenarios by Sebastiano Torcivia deal with initiatives created the Marsala wine consortium. The paper traces the drastic reduction of the adherents to the consortium and contrasts between the primary producers, including the Florio company (today Duca di Salaparuta spa). 

The great waves of accounting thought: an attempt of comparison between English and Italian literature by Massimo Costa reports author's speech at the XV Biennale of the Italian Society for Accounting History on October, 23rd, 2020, as the Introductory intervention of the Congress. It concerned the discerning of several parallel waves between English and Italian Accounting literature, since the early beginnings and until the advent of the Globalization Era. 

ECONOMICS 

Growth uncertainty, European Central Bank intervention and the Italian debt is the paper by Andrea Consiglio and Stavros Zenios on European Central Bank Covis-19's intervention. They claim the BCE provides a buffer against the uncertainty faced by European Union economies in the face of COVID-19. However, this intervention has alleviated concern about Italy's debt for the time being, but without it, Italy is vulnerable to a debt crisis.

STATISTICS

A note on weighted third-order statistics for spatial point processes by Giada Adelfio, through a weighted version of the directional K-statistics, that is the T function, shows some theoretical results provided as a generalization of theorems introduced in Adelfio and Schoenberg (2009).

Estimating the number of changepoints in segmented regression models: comparative study and application by Nicoletta D'Angelo, Andrea Priulla, dealing with the selecting issue of the number of changepoints in segmented regression models, reviews selection criteria, namely information criteria and a hypothesis testing, and proposes a novel application in the context of students' careers in higher education. 

Calogero Massimo Cammalleri - Editor in Chief